Stephen Clode, while listening with a certain pleasure to the archdeacon's hints, did not dream of the good turn which fortune was about to do him. If he had foreseen it, he would probably have taken a bolder part in the conversation, and parted from the elder clergyman with a more jubilant step. As it was, he heard no rumor that evening, nor was it until ten o'clock on the Sunday morning that he learned anything was amiss. Calling at the house in the churchyard at that hour, he was received by Mrs. Baker herself; and he remarked at once that the housekeeper's face fell in a manner far from flattering when she recognized him.

"Oh, it is you, is it, Mr. Clode?" she said, her tone one of disappointment. "You have not seen him, sir, have you?"

"Seen whom?" the curate replied in surprise.

"Mr. Lindo, sir?"

"Why? Is he not here?"

"He is not, indeed, sir," the housekeeper said, putting her head out to look up and down. "He never came back last night, and we have not heard of him. I sent across to the Town House to inquire, and the only thing Mrs. Hammond could say was that Mr. Lindo was to follow them, and they supposed he had come."

"Well, but--who is to do the duty at the church?" Clode ejaculated. His dismay at the moment was genuine, for he did not at once see how much this was to his advantage.

"There is only you, sir, unless he comes in time," the housekeeper added despondently.

"But I am going to the Hamlet church," said Clode, rapidly turning things over in his mind. If there was no one at the parish church to conduct the chief service of the week, what a talk there would be! Why it would almost be matter for the bishop's interference! "You see I cannot possibly neglect that," he continued, in answer as much to the remonstrance of his own conscience as to the housekeeper. "It was the rector's own arrangement, Mrs. Baker. You may be sure he will be here in time for the eleven o'clock service. Mr. Homfray has kept him over night. That is all."

"You do not think he has met with an accident, sir? They say the coal-pits on Baer Hill----"

"Pooh, pooh! He will be here in a few minutes, you will see," the curate answered. And he affected to be so cheerfully certain of this that he would not wait even for a little while, but started at once for the Hamlet church--a small chapel-of-ease in the outskirts of the town. There he put on his surplice early, and was ready in excellent time. Punctuality is a virtue.

At half-past ten the bells of the great church began to ring, and presently door after door in the quiet streets about it opened silently, and little parties issued forth in their Sunday clothes and walked stiffly and slowly toward the building. At the moment when the High Street was dotted most thickly with these groups, and the small bell was tinkling its impatient summons, the rattle of an old taxed-cart was heard as the vehicle flashed quickly over the bridge at the foot of the street. One and another of the church-goers turned in curiosity to gaze, for such a sound was rare on a Sunday morning. Judge of their astonishment, then, when they recognized, perched up beside the boy who urged on the pony, no less a person than the rector himself! As he jogged up the street in his sorry conveyance and with his sorry companion, he had to pass under the fire of a battery of eyes which did not fail to notice all the peculiarities of his appearance. His tie was awry and his chin unshaven. He had a haggard, dissipated air, as of one who had been up all night, and there was a great smudge on his cheek. He looked dissipated---nothing less than disreputable, some said; and he seemed aware of it, for he sat erect, gazing straight before him, and declining to see any one. At the top of the street he descended hastily, and, as the bell jerked out its final note, hurried toward the vestry with a depressed and gloomy face.

"Well!" said Mr. Bonamy to Kate, who was walking up by his side, and whose face for some mysterious reason was flushed and troubled, "I think that is the coolest young man I have ever met!"

"Eh?" said a voice behind them as they entered the porch--the speaker was Gregg. "What do you think of that, Bonamy? A gay young spark, is he not?"

There was time for no more then. But as the congregation waited in their seats through a long voluntary, many were the nods and winks, and incessant the low mutterings, as one communicated to another the details of the scene outside, and his or her view of them. When the rector appeared--nine minutes late by Mr. Bonamy's watch--he looked pale and fagged, and the sermon he preached was of the shortest. Nine-tenths of the congregation noted only the brevity of the discourse and drew their conclusions. But Kate Bonamy, who sat by her father with downcast eyes and a tinge of color still in her cheeks, and who scarcely once looked up at the weary face and tumbled hair, fancied, heaven knows why, that she detected a new pathos and a deeper tone of appeal in the few simple sentences; and though she had scarcely spoken to the rector for a month, and was nursing a tiny contempt for him, the girl felt on a sudden more kindly disposed toward the young man.

Not so Mr. Bonamy, He came out of church chuckling; full of a grim delight in the fulfilment of his predictions. It was not his custom to linger in the porch, for he was not a sociable man; but he did so to-day, and, letting Kate and Daintry go on, formed one of a coterie of men, who had no difficulty in coming to a conclusion about the rector.

"He has been studying hard, poor fellow!" said Gregg, with a wink--there is no dislike so mean and cruel as that which the ill-bred man feels for the gentleman--"reading the devil's books all night!"

"Nine minutes late!" said the lawyer. "That is what comes of having a young fellow who is always gadding about the country!"

"He could not gad to a more congenial place than Holberton, I should think," sneered a third.

And then all the sins which the Homfrays had ever committed, and all those which had ever been laid to their charge, were cited to render the rector's case more black. To do him justice, Mr. Bonamy took but a listener's part in this. He was a shrewd man, and he did not believe that the rector could have had anything to do with an elopement from Holberton which had taken place before his name was heard in the county; but he was honestly assured that the young fellow had been sitting over the cards half the night. And as for the other crimes, perhaps he would commit them if he were left to follow his own foolish devices.

"What is ill-gotten soon goes," said one charitable person with a sneer. "You may depend upon it that what we hear is true."

"It is all of a piece," said another. "A man does not have a follower of that kind for nothing?"

"It comes over the devil's back, and goes--you know how?" said a third. "But perhaps he is wise to make the most of it while it lasts. He is consequential enough now, but the Homfrays will not have much to say to him presently, you will see. A few weeks, and he will go."

"Well, let him go for the d--d dissipated gambling parson he is!" said Gregg coarsely, carried away by the unusual agreement with him. "And the sooner the better, say I!"

The man beside him, a little startled by the doctor's violence, turned round to make sure that they were not overheard, and found himself face to face with the rector, who, seeking to go out--as was not his custom, for he generally used the vestry door--by the porch, had walked into the midst of the group, even as Gregg opened his mouth. A glance at the young man's reddening cheek and compressed lips apprised the startled group that he had overheard something at least.

In one way it was the crisis of Lindo's fate at Claversham. But he did not know it. If he had been wise--if he had been such a man as his curate, for instance; or if, without being wise, he had learned a little of the prudence which comes of necessity with years--he would have passed through them in silence, satisfied with such revenge as mute contempt could give him. But he was not old, nor very wise; and perhaps certain things had lately jarred on his nerves, so that he was not quite himself. He did not pass by in silence, but, instead, stood for a moment. Then, singling Gregg out with a withering glance, "I am much obliged to you for your good opinion," he said to him; "but I should be still more obliged if you would swear elsewhere, sir, and not in the porch of my church. Leave the building! Go at once!" And he pointed toward the churchyard with the air of an angry schoolmaster.

But Gregg did not move. He was astounded by this direct attack, but he had the courage of numbers on his side, and, though he did not dare to answer, he did not budge. Neither did the others, though they felt ashamed of themselves, and looked all ways at once. Only one of them all met the rector's glance fairly, and that was Mr. Bonamy. "I think the least said the soonest mended, Mr. Lindo," he replied, with an acrid smile.

"I am sorry that you did not think of that before," retorted the young man, standing before them with his fair head thrown back, his clerical coat hanging loose, and his brow dark with indignation--for he had heard enough to be able to guess the cause of Gregg's remark. "Do you come to church only to cavil and backbite?--to put the worst construction on what you cannot understand?"

"Speaking for myself," replied the church warden coolly, "the sole thing with which I can charge myself is the remark that you were somewhat late for service this morning, Mr. Lindo."

"And if I was?" said the clergyman in his haughtiest tone.

"Well, of course there may have been a good cause for it," the lawyer replied drily. "But it is a thing I have not known happen here for twenty years."

An altercation with these men, none of whom were well disposed toward him, and half of whom were tradespeople, was the last thing which the young rector should have allowed himself to enter upon, and the last thing indeed to which he would have condescended in his normal frame of mind. But on this unlucky morning he was nervous and irritable; and, finding himself thus bearded and defied, he spoke foolishly. "You trouble yourself too much, Mr. Bonamy," he said impulsively, "with things which do not concern you! The parish, among other things. You have set yourself, as I know, to thwart and embarrass me; but I warn you that you are not strong enough! I shall find means to----"

"To put me down, in fact?" said Mr. Bonamy.

The young man hesitated, his face crimson. His opponent's sallow features, seamed with a hundred astute wrinkles, warned him, if the covert smiles of the others did not, that, in his present mood at any rate, he was not a match for the lawyer. He had gone too far already, as he was now aware. "No," he replied, swallowing his rage, "but to keep you to your proper province, as I hope to keep to mine. I wish you good morning."

He passed through them, and hurried away, more angry with them, and with himself for allowing them to provoke him, than he had ever felt in his life. He knew well that he had been foolish. He knew that he had lowered himself in their eyes by his display of temper. But, though he was bitterly annoyed with himself, the consciousness that the fault had originally lain with them, and that they had grievously misjudged him, kept his anger hot; for there is no wrath so fierce as the indignation of the man falsely accused. He called them under his breath an uncharitable, spiteful, tattling crew; and was so far unnerved in thought of them that he had entered his dining-room before he remembered that he was engaged to take the mid-day meal at the Town House, as he had done once or twice before, and then walked up with Laura to the schools.

He washed and changed hurriedly, keeping his anger hot the while, and then went across, with the tale on the tip of his tongue. Again, if he had been wise, he would have kept what had happened to himself. But the soothing luxury of unfolding his wrong to some one who would sympathize was one he could not in his soreness forego.

It was a particularly mild day for the fourth Sunday in Advent, and he found Miss Hammond still lingering before the door, She was looking for violets under the north wall, and he joined her, and naturally broke out at once with the story of what had happened. She was wearing a little close bonnet, which set off her piquant features and bright coloring to peculiar advantage, and, as far as looks went, no young man in trouble ever had a better listener. Only to stand beside her on the lawn, where the old trees shut out all view of the town and the troubles he connected with it, was a relief. Of course the search for violets was soon abandoned. "It is abominable!" she said. But her voice was like the cooing of a dove. She did everything softly. Even her indignation was gentle.

"But you have not heard yet," he protested, "why I really was late."

"I know what is being said," she murmured, looking up at him, a gleam of humor in her brown eyes--"that you stayed at the Homfrays' all night, playing cards. My maid told me as we came in--after church."

"Ha! I knew that they were saying something of the kind," he replied savagely. He was so stern that she felt her little attempt at badinage reproved. "The true reason was of a very different description. What spiteful busybodies they are! I started to return last evening about half-past nine, but as I passed Baer Hill Colliery I learned that there had been an accident. A man going down the shaft with the night shift had been crushed--hurt beyond help," the rector continued in a lower voice. "He wanted to see a clergyman, and the other pitmen, some of whom had seen me pass earlier in the day, stopped me and took me to him."

"How sad! How very sad!" she ejaculated. Somehow she felt ill at ease with him in this mood. With his last words a kind of veil had fallen between them.

"I stayed with him the night," the rector continued. "He died at half-past nine this morning. I came straight from that to this. And they say these things of me!"

His voice, though low, was hard, and yet there was a suspicious break in it as he uttered his last words. Injustice touches a man, young and not yet hardened, very sorely; and he was overwrought. Laura, fingering her little bunch of violets, heard the catch in his voice, and knew that he was not very far from tears.

She was almost terrified. She longed to respond, to say the proper thing, but here her powers deserted her. She was not capable of much emotion, unless the call especially concerned herself; and she could not rise to this occasion. She could only murmur again that it was abominable and too bad, or, taking her cue from the young man's face, that it was very sad. She said enough, it is true, to satisfy him, though not herself; for he only wanted a listener. And when he went in to lunch Mrs. Hammond more than bore him out in all his denunciations; so that when he left to go to the schools he had fully made up his mind to carry things through.

This unfortunate quarrel indeed did him great injury by throwing him into the arms of the party which his own pleasure and taste led him to prefer. He did not demur when Mrs. Hammond--meaning little evil, but expressing prejudices which at one time she had sedulously cultivated (for when one lives near the town one must take especial care not to be confounded with it)--talked of a set of butchers and bakers, and said, much more strongly than he had, that Mr. Bonamy must be kept in his place. A little quarrel with the lawyer, a little social relaxation in which the young fellow had lost sight of the excellent intentions with which he had set out, then this final quarrel--such had been the course of events; sufficient, taken with his own fastidiousness and inexperience, to bring him to this.

Mrs. Hammond, standing at the drawing-room window, watched him as he walked down the short drive. "I like that young man," she said decisively. "He is thrown away upon those people."

Laura, who had not gone to the schools, yawned. "He has not one-half the brains of some one else we know, mother," she answered.

"Who is that?"

Laura did not reply; and probably her mother understood, for she did not press the question. "Well," Mrs. Hammond said, after a moment's silence, "perhaps he has not. I do not know. But at any rate he is a gentleman from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes."

"I dare say he is," said Laura languidly.

Mrs. Hammond, depositing her own portly form in a suitable chair, watched her daughter curiously. She would have given a good deal to be able to read the girl's mind and learn her intentions; but she was too wise to ask questions, and had always given Laura the fullest liberty. She had watched the growth of the intimacy between her and Mr. Clode without demur, feeling a strong liking for the man herself, though she scarcely thought him a suitable match for her daughter. On the old rector's death there had seemed for a few days a chance of Mr. Clode being appointed his successor; and at that time Mrs. Hammond had fancied she detected a shade of anxiety and excitement in her daughter's manner. But Mr. Clode had not been appointed, and the new rector had come; and Laura had apparently transferred her favor from the curate to him.

At this Mrs. Hammond had felt somewhat troubled--at first; but in a short time she had naturally reconciled herself to the change, the rector's superiority as a parti being indisputable. Yet still Mrs. Hammond felt no certainty as to Laura's real feelings, and, gazing at her this afternoon, was as much in the dark as ever. That the girl was fond of her she knew; indeed, it was quite a pretty sight to see the daughter purring about the mother. But Mrs. Hammond was more than half inclined to doubt now whether Laura was fond, or capable of being fond, of any other human being except herself.

She sighed gently as she thought of this, and rang the bell for tea. "I think we will have it early this afternoon," she said, "I feel I want a cup."